After a passing shower, the weather turned much cooler.
Luo Chen strolled along the mountain path through Crescent Moon Valley.
Beside him walked Gu Caiyi, who had just hurried back.
"Our cooperation with the Nangong family has been settled."
"Starting next month, they will supply us with a thousand spirit stones' worth of fuzhu beast milk each month. They even went out of their way to ask if we needed milk from another type of demon beast, but I turned them down for now."
Luo Chen offered a word of praise. "You were right to refuse. For now, two varieties of milk tea are enough for Mixue Ice City to gain a firm foothold in Dahe Market. Unless a new competitor shows up, we can slowly roll out other new products later."
"Mm, that was my thinking too."
Gu Caiyi nodded firmly. "Also, the Great River Gang has agreed to resume supplying us with Huanyu jade. As for the price, it follows the Mountain Breaker Gang's old rules without change."
This was good news as well.
Lately, when refining Jade Marrow Pills, Luo Chen had been using Huanyu jade left over in the Pill Hall's inventory from the Mountain Breaker Gang era.
However, after two months of frantic refinement, the raw materials had virtually hit bottom.
The Great River Gang taking the initiative to show goodwill was indeed a welcome development.
"Per your instructions, aside from our two shop locations in the inner and outer city, we've already contacted the fi—four major families."
The former five Foundation Establishment families of Dahe Market had become four with the demise of the Fu family.
Even the Chen family, which was Foundation Establishment in name only, found itself in dire straits.
Several small factions formed by rogue cultivators were eyeing them like tigers stalking prey, very much intending to emulate the Luotian Association's feat.
"To each family, we provided several complimentary bottles of our finest-grade Jade Marrow Pills and offered them our gilded VIP discount rate."
"They're still hesitating, but I feel certain this will go through once they try them."
When she said this, Gu Caiyi was brimming with confidence.
Clan cultivators were different from rogue cultivators.
Their model resembled sects more closely.
High-realm members focused on cultivation and major decisions.
Those of middle realms or advanced age were assigned to various miscellaneous affairs.
The young, low-realm juniors actually received the best treatment.
They took no part in menial chores and focused solely on cultivation.
For these juniors, the clans often followed the sect model, issuing set quotas of spirit stones and medicinal pills to aid their cultivation.
From time to time, they would also organize sparring and trial battles between their younger generation and those of other clans.
This kept them from letting their combat skills languish while cultivating in isolation.
This was why rootless rogue cultivators so deeply envied clan and sect cultivators.
When they were at their weakest, they least had to worry about cultivation resources.
This was the very market the Luotian Association was currently targeting.
They wanted to introduce the Jade Marrow Pill into each clan and establish it as their designated cultivation pill.
Luo Chen had made this decision precisely because the Spirit Herb Pavilion's pills were exorbitant.
Qi-Nourishing Pills costing around a hundred spirit stones a bottle were truly not something early- or mid-stage Qi Refinement cultivators could casually afford.
Even cultivation clans had to weigh their pill rations carefully.
Yet taking pills to assist cultivation was the greatest shortcut on a cultivator's path.
Compared to Qi-Nourishing Pills, Jade Marrow Pills were cheap enough, and the supply could keep up.
As long as Luo Chen lowered the price slightly, he could fully capture this lower-tier market.
When that time came, the Luotian Association wouldn't even need to worry about expanding their market.
These few clans alone, together with Dahe Market's rogue cultivators, would be enough to consume all the pills produced by the association.
In fact, Mi Shuhua had pursued a similar overall strategy back then.
However, in the end, he had been unwilling to give up immediate profits and never moved toward these Foundation Establishment clans with steady demand.
Of course, at the time, the Xuanyi Society formed by the five major families had also stood in subtle opposition to the Mountain Breaker Gang.
Luo Chen naturally would not repeat that mistake.
Besides, the relationship between the Luotian Association and the various clans was currently quite "harmonious."
Amid Gu Caiyi's briefing, the two took an unhurried walk around Crescent Moon Valley.
Everywhere they went, choruses of "Greetings, Guild Leader!" and "Good morning, Guild Leader!" rang out.
The gazes of those cultivators toward Luo Chen had also changed from their initial casual attitude to cautious respect, tinged with a hint of awe.
No matter what, it was Luo Chen who had led the Luotian Association to bring down the Fu family!
What was more, in the final battle, this association leader of theirs had defeated Fu Zhang, who possessed a talisman treasure, right under the gaze of thousands.
His methods commanded trust.
His strength commanded awe!
"Cough, cough..."
"Luo Chen, are you alright?" Gu Caiyi looked at him with concern.
Waving his hand, Luo Chen took a deep breath of the fresh air.
"I'm fine. Give it a few more days at most, and this injury of mine will heal."
He was telling the truth, not putting on a brave face.
For cultivators, the most severe wounds were injuries to the divine soul.
Next came the dantian.
After that were the meridians and acupoints.
In comparison, visceral damage was also a rather serious internal injury, second only to damage to meridians and acupoints.
However, thanks to a cultivator's robust physique, damaged internal organs would often heal on their own.
Consequently, rarely did anyone concoct specific healing pills aimed at injuries to internal viscera and organs.
Thus, compared to targeted pills that mended meridians and external injuries that were easily treated, visceral damage actually took somewhat longer to recover.
Luo Chen was in no hurry. Taking advantage of his injured lungs, he could grind his Healing Art to Grandmaster level; he was only a few dozen proficiency points away.
He also wanted to see what effects a Grandmaster-level Healing Art would have, and how it would measure up against part-time physicians like Granny Yuan and Luo Tianhong.
When they reached a pond, Luo Chen stopped in his tracks.
"Go ahead and tend to your tasks. You don't need to keep me company."
"All right, take good care of yourself then. Later on, I'll have Granny Yuan brew you a bowl of pig lung soup."
After Gu Caiyi left, Luo Chen silently walked up to the pond.
And then—
"Hey!"
"Ah!"
A shrill, childish squeak rang out, giving Luo Chen quite a start instead.
Qu Lingjun jumped down from an ornamental rock, holding a book, and bowed respectfully to Luo Chen.
"Greetings, Guild Leader!"
Luo Chen gestured with his hand and took the book. Flipping through it, he asked, "It's been so long. How well have you memorized it?"
Qu Lingjun said apprehensively, "I should be pretty close."
"'Pretty close' won't do!"
"Being 'pretty close' in ordinary times might mean falling far short at a critical moment."
Luo Chen smiled faintly and closed the *Illustrated Guide to a Hundred Herbs*.
He sat down on the bluestone where Qu Lingjun had been earlier, lifted the hem of his robe, and crossed his right leg over his left knee. Once the hem covered his lap, he spoke slowly:
"Come, I'll ask and you'll answer. If I'm satisfied, I'll give you a small reward."
Qu Lingjun's eyes lit up.
He immediately stood straight as a rod before Luo Chen.
"Ginseng is among the most common medicinal herbs, frequently used whether for alchemy or personal cultivation. Do you know what varieties of ginseng exist?"
Without hesitation, Qu Lingjun replied, "Those dwelling in wilderness and marshes are wild mountain ginseng. Those planted in spiritual fields are transplanted mountain ginseng. There is also rock ginseng growing on cliff faces and mine shafts, blood ginseng formed by absorbing the blood of living beings, and according to rumors, snow ginseng atop boundless snowy peaks..."
Having finished his answer, he puffed out his little chest, waiting for Luo Chen's praise.
Luo Chen chuckled softly. "Then how does one identify the most common transplanted mountain ginseng? Its age, medicinal potency, and appearance."
Qu Lingjun pursed his lips and replied at an unhurried pace, "One should identify it by five aspects: rootlet, reed neck, skin, striation, and body. These are the five forms of ginseng."
"How do you explain the rootlet?"
"Long rootlets are aged and tough, sparse and slender; if they have pearl-like nodes, that indicates one year of growth... Besides these, there are the three methods of observing, smelling, and tasting. The five forms belong to the observing method, while smelling uses aroma to discern the strength of medicinal potency. Rumor has it that thousand-year ginseng emits an ethereal fragrance even if grown in a foul and filthy place."
...
"How do you distinguish blue citrus grass from abyssal star grass?"
"The two share similar shapes and aromas. But when blue citrus grass touches the tongue, it has a blend of sweet and sour."
"Yet abyssal star grass cannot be ingested; it is extremely toxic. How can one put it in the mouth to tell them apart?"
"In that case, one must pair it with a light-dispelling leaf, which negates the lethal poison of abyssal star grass. In fact, consuming large quantities of it can even advance one's spiritual power."
...
"What is the nature of Phantom Gloom?"
"How can stone bamboo be harvested without damage?"
Question after question rolled off Luo Chen's tongue.
At first, Qu Lingjun answered swiftly and accurately, but as things progressed, his thinking slowed.
Particularly when it involved several similar herbs, even after Luo Chen took them out from his storage bag for him to inspect, the boy had to rack his brains before finally venturing an answer.
In this manner, time slipped away into the afternoon.
Finally, with Qu Lingjun dripping with sweat, Luo Chen stood up and brought the examination to a close.
"Guild Leader, did I pass?"
"Mm, not bad. Though you're not very fluent yet, you've basically memorized everything."
Wiping away his sweat, Qu Lingjun looked up and asked eagerly, "Then what is my reward?"
Luo Chen smiled, shook his head, and produced a book from his storage bag.
The boy looked down. "It's still the *Illustrated Guide to a Hundred Herbs*?"
Yet when he flipped it open, his mouth fell agape.
"Is this the *Illustrated Guide to a Hundred Herbs* with your personal annotations, Guild Leader?"
"That's right!"
Luo Chen said seriously, "Memorizing it is merely the first step. But every single herb has many uses—how to combine them, portion taboos—none of which are in the original text. So next, you must familiarize yourself with the unique properties of each herb."
Qu Lingjun shifted restlessly. "But everything in books is rigid and lifeless!"
"I'll allow you to withdraw a certain quota of herbs from the herb pavilion for hands-on experimentation."
Hearing that he could get hands-on, Qu Lingjun grew instantly thrilled.
This was simply wonderful.
"In addition, I'll give you a talisman for self-defense."
"But I haven't started cultivating yet. I don't have spiritual power."
"No matter. I have my ways."
Luo Chen smiled faintly and flicked a finger. Wincing with pain, Qu Lingjun realized his fingertip had been sliced open.
"Drip your blood onto this talisman."
Gritting his teeth, the young boy put on a brave front and squeezed out a drop of fresh blood, letting it fall onto the pale yellow talisman.
Luo Chen formed hand seals and released streams of spiritual power.
Amid flickering spiritual light, the drop of blood soaked completely into the talisman.
"There. If you encounter danger in the future, this talisman can save your life."
"Go play. No need to recite books today."
Luo Chen waved his hand.
Biting his finger, the boy dashed off merrily.
Watching this, Luo Chen could not help a tender smile.
At some point, Wang Yuan had walked up beside him.
"You think highly of this child?"
"He's alright."
"Yet he has only four spiritual roots; the Great Dao is out of his reach."
"Is my aptitude not even worse than his?"
"Still..."
Luo Chen said lazily, "Poor aptitude isn't entirely without merit. At least in the future, once he knows the Great Dao is beyond reach, he can settle his mind and invest the time normally spent on cultivation into other pursuits."
Wang Yuan paused, his gaze falling thoughtfully upon the copy of the *Illustrated Guide to a Hundred Herbs* in Luo Chen's hand that the boy had been reciting earlier.
"Why were you looking for me?"
"Nothing major. Now that your injuries are mostly healed, I wanted to hand the Luotian Association's affairs back to you."
Wang Yuan gave a wry smile. "You have no idea—in just these few days, a massive pile of association matters has accumulated."
"Hm?" Luo Chen asked curiously. "What else is there? I already settled everything on the Gold Hall's side. As for rewards and the aftermath, Murong Qinglian is taking care of those."
"Among the Fu family's resources were books related to talisman crafting. Lately, everyone has been debating whether we should establish a hall dedicated to crafting and selling talismans."
Luo Chen understood at once.
In that battle a few days ago, after he killed Fu Zhang, the rogue cultivators of Dahe Market had been temporarily intimidated into submission.
Seizing the opportunity, the Luotian Association, led by Wang Yuan, had swept inside to scavenge extensively, hauling back quite a substantial haul of resources.
However, establishing another talisman-crafting division?
With hardly a second thought, Luo Chen rejected it out of hand.
Wang Yuan didn't object either; he had not favored the idea to begin with.
"However, you can have the books related to talisman crafting sent over to me."
Wang Yuan casually agreed, but as soon as the words left his mouth, his brow furrowed.
"You're not thinking of studying talisman crafting on the side, are you?"
"Why not?" Luo Chen said with confidence. "Though I lack a foundation in talisman craft, when it comes to the path of spells, I'm quite confident."
"Knowing how to cast spells doesn't mean you can craft talismans," Wang Yuan advised earnestly. "Besides, alchemy already takes up far too much of your time. If you distract yourself with talisman crafting as well, it will drag down your cultivation."
"Don't worry, I know how to weigh the pros and cons."
Seeing that he could not dissuade him, Wang Yuan said no more.
In any case, by rights, this haul of resources was Luo Chen's to allocate.
Wang Yuan moved quickly; before long, he sent someone to deliver everything to Luo Chen.
Alone, Luo Chen opened the storage bag.
*Whoa!*
It truly was a considerable fortune!
There were seven talisman brushes alone, the best of which was rank-one high-grade, named Jinzhu.
Additionally, there were ten jars of fine talisman ink and over a hundred sheets of quality talisman parchment.
And this was only a portion; most of the resources had remained with the Merit Hall.
Luo Chen bypassed these items and looked at the books and bamboo slips:
*Introduction to Talisman Crafting*
*Compendium of Rank-One Talismans*
*Elementary Guide to the Talisman Dao*
*On Key Points of Inscribing the Fireball Art*
*Simplifying Large-Scale Spells for Talisman Crafting*
After reading the titles, Luo Chen could not help shaking his head.
"To achieve modest success in talisman crafting would likely take half a lifetime. Even with the system's help, it would have to be measured in years."
He had clear self-awareness; the system was not omnipotent.
Take alchemy, for instance. First, he had inherited ten years of foundation from his predecessor, then spent over a year immersing himself in the Fasting Pill.
Interspersed with that, he had spent roughly a year concocting Myriad Wonders Pills.
Later, he mastered the Jade Marrow Pill and refined it persistently.
Only after building such profound accumulation was he barely able to deduce the Blood Burning Pill formula.
One could say that in the realm of rank-one pill refinement as a whole, Luo Chen could barely be called an alchemy master.
Yet even so, he still felt the Dao of Alchemy was vast and profound, akin to a towering mountain.
He had only just set foot at the foot of that mountain.
If he spent more time on talisman crafting, he could forget about seeking longevity in this lifetime.
The reason he had gathered these items was simply to see if he could use another mountain's stone to polish his own jade in the study of spells.
After all, talisman crafting was the act of inscribing spells onto talisman parchment.
First and foremost, it required the talisman crafter to possess mastery over the given spell.
The inscribing process also demanded precise control over spiritual power, regulating the spell's potency, and more.
All of this, to varying degrees, could allow Luo Chen to glean valuable insights when practicing spells.
In his battle against Fu Zhang, aside from deploying his supreme-grade dharma artifact, he had also used Carefree Wind Riding and his perfected Fireball Art.
In doing so, he had avoided the brunt of the magic treasure warhammer's strike while threatening his opponent.
What appeared to outsiders as the "Blazing Sun Art" was actually his Fireball Art at Great Perfection.
Reflecting on the scene back then, Luo Chen was far from satisfied.
"Pressed for time, I fused too few fireballs. It was only enough to deliver a devastating blow to a ninth-layer Qi Refinement cultivator, falling far short of the power comparable to a rank-two spell."
A rank-two spell was on par with Foundation Establishment methods.
In other words, it could threaten Foundation Establishment cultivators!
"Now that I have broken through to the ninth layer of Qi Refinement, my strength has greatly improved. If I can further refine the Fireball Art a bit, perhaps it could threaten Foundation Establishment cultivators."
This was Luo Chen's true goal!
He had had his fill of being suppressed by Foundation Establishment cultivators like Mi Shuhua and Miao Wen.
Nor did he ever want to face the covetous eyes of other Foundation Establishment cultivators in the future.
Therefore, he had to master a method capable of threatening Foundation Establishment cultivators.
Spells were his direction for a breakthrough.
"I can't rush. Slow and steady; haste makes waste."
Luo Chen picked out *On Key Points of Inscribing the Fireball Art* and stored the remaining books in his storage bag.
He would start his study from what he knew best.
He wanted to see just how the Fireball Talisman, the most common low-grade talisman, was crafted.
...
In the dead of night, in Mount Changyin.
Faint howls of demonic wolves drifted on the air, accompanied by the constant hum of insects.
Luo Chen channeled the Spirit Eye Art, gazing at a crater thirty feet across in the distance, blasted out by a fireball.
This was the result of casting a single small fireball.
Its potency had advanced considerably compared to before.
Provided he did not go up against ninth-layer Qi Refinement cultivators, he was confident he could face dozens of mid- to late-stage Qi Refinement cultivators all on his own.
"My combat methods are exceptionally diverse, and my crowd-clearing lethality against lower-realm cultivators can be called top-tier among peers."
Luo Chen had a crystal-clear understanding of his own strength.
What he needed to do now was dismantle the inner workings of the Fireball Art—not for the sake of making talismans, but to achieve the effects of the Blazing Sun Art through fusion.
"Go!"
With a thought, Luo Chen formed hand seals once again.
In truth, he was already capable of casting the Fireball Art instantaneously, yet for this casting, he still chose to perform every gesture step by step.
Spiritual light flared in his eyes as Luo Chen stared unblinkingly at the output, convergence, and formation of his spiritual power.
Then came the fireball's flight path and the process of detonation.
*Boom!*
Another crater appeared. Luo Chen rubbed his tired eyes.
"Spells use hand seals and incantations as primers, with spiritual power as their source of energy, ultimately taking shape."
"The system's blessing allowed me to bypass the steps of hand seals and incantations through repeated practice, reaching the realm of instant casting."
"In truth, that is indeed the most correct direction."
"If spiritual sense can be projected outward, a single thought can replace hand seals and incantations to cast relatively low-grade spells."
"The direction is correct, but previously I only knew what worked without understanding why."
"Without outward projection of spiritual sense, hand seals and incantations actually represent the pathways of spiritual power convergence, structural composition, detonation triggers, and so on."
"If I hold back the final surge of spiritual power without releasing it, does that mean the fireball's detonation can be delayed?"
"If this surge of spiritual power is injected beforehand, could it shave off a portion of the casting time?"
Amid continuous contemplation, Luo Chen cast fireball after fireball.
Circulating the Spirit Eye Art uninterrupted, he monitored every nuance of change.
Rather than starting directly with fusing fireballs to form the Blazing Sun Art, he chose to deconstruct and analyze the most basic Fireball Art.
For Luo Chen believed that no high-grade spell could afford to neglect its fundamental foundations.
This inspiration had actually come from the rank-two spell *Landslide*.
The described power of that spell was exceedingly formidable.
It was in no way inferior to powerful rank-two spells such as the Ten Thousand Swords Art, Ice Soul Divine Needle, and Thunder Shock, and even surpassed the fire-attribute Blazing Sun Art by a notch.
Yet to learn it, one had to master three prerequisite spells first.
Was this not a testament to the importance of fundamentals?
By daybreak, Luo Chen halted his cultivation.
Although he had not yet completely solved the slow fusion speed of the Blazing Sun Art, he had reaped abundant gains over the course of the night.
This was reflected in how both his standard Fireball Art and his lethal minor technique, Dancing Fireflies, had grown even more formidable than before.
"Strange, why do my eyes hurt so much?"
Luo Chen subconsciously rubbed his eyes again.
"Is it because I overused the Spirit Eye Art last night?"
"The Spirit Eye Art..."
Luo Chen paused, his eyes snapping shut.
Amid the pitch darkness, dazzling colors subtly shimmered.
The Spirit Eye Art had finally reached Grand Perfection!
Chapter 154